Little Heroes Campaign Toolkit

Little Heroes campaign toolkit

Why are we running an attendance campaign? 

Regular school attendance is important for children and young people. Research shows there is a clear link between high attendance and educational outcomes, leading to better life opportunities and the best results that an individual can achieve.  

There are also other benefits to young people’s wellbeing such as nurturing long-lasting friendships, engaging in new activities and enabling young people to be able to develop in a supportive environment.

Across the UK, we are seeing a drop in attendance rates and attendance in Staffordshire schools is down by 2.3% compared to previous years. 

We know that many schools are running their own great initiatives to boost attendance, but we feel that there is a real benefit in running a unified campaign across Staffordshire to support students and schools.

For this reason, we are rolling out our ‘Little Heroes’ campaign, to support Key Stage 1 pupils, which will run as a trial from May until July in selected schools across the county.

Following feedback, we will review the campaign in the summer and expand the campaign to support additional schools and age groups. 

What is the Little Heroes campaign?

We understand that for many families, getting their children to attend school can be a real challenge, and many children face significant barriers. We have taken this into consideration when planning our campaign. 

The tone will be supportive and encouraging – with a strong focus on emotional health support. Our attendance campaign focuses on the ‘HERO’ theme to encourage the message: 

Here  
Everyday  
Ready  
On time

At school, materials will be displayed to remind and motivate pupils, as well as sticker charts and certificates to reward pupils that are leading by example and to create a fun and engaging attendance activity in the classroom.

Helpful Heroes

For pupils that are struggling with their emotional health, we have created a ‘Helpful Heroes’ workbook to understand children’s barriers to avoiding school and to help manage their worries through a book full of mindfulness activities, suitable for their age group.

Pupils can take these workbooks home to fill them in, in their own time. We have created a ‘Helpful Heroes parents’ guide’ to talk you through the different activities and mindfulness activities.

How you can get involved

Little Heroes resources

If you are not one of our trial schools, and wish to support the campaign, you can download our posters and print them using the links below. 

A3 School Attendance Heroes poster

Spread the word on social media 

We will also be sharing video content featuring Staffordshire pupils talking about life at school on our social media pages.  

We encourage you to like, share, comment and engage with our posts to help us spread the word far and wide – we hope you like our little characters’ school tales and look forward to hearing your feedback.  

If you would like to be involved in the Little Heroes campaign in the future, please email danielle.taylor2@staffordshire.gov.uk to register your interest. 

Helpful links for parents 
 

Helpful Heroes activity book – A parent’s guide  
Emotionally Based School Avoidance Video for Parents & Carers (youtube.com) 
Parents/ Carers EBSA Guidance | Support Services for Education 
School Anxiety and Refusal | Parent Guide to Support | YoungMinds 
Not Fine in School - School Refusal, School Attendance 
Resources for families | Children's Commissioner for England (childrenscommissioner.gov.uk) 
How do I deal with school refusal and Emotionally Based School Avoidance (EBSA)? - Support for Parents from Action For Children 
SENDIASS SEND IASS - Staffordshire Family Partnership (staffs-iass.org) 
Parent Talk - Support for Parents from Action For Children 
SilverCloud. Making Space For Healthy Minds (silvercloudhealth.com) 

Emotionally Based School Avoidance Parent Workbook